All Hallows' Eve
by Kingpin1055
Summary: Halloween is normally a time for creative teenagers to enjoy themselves, but when it's a Thorston party, and Astrid is planning to set Hamish up with a near-stranger, all bets are off.
1. Bonfires burning bright

**October 14th**

* * *

A hearty murmur of conversation provided the soundtrack to lunchtime in the cafeteria of Berk High School, a quasi-peacefulness that was disturbed by the cheerful invitation of the blonde-haired girl who'd just sat opposite him:

"Check this out."

The sophomore turned his emerald eyes away from his lunch and toward her, where they then flitted down to the sheet of lurid orange paper that lay atop the cafeteria table, emblazoned with the seal of the dual portents of doom and destruction: the Thorston twins.

The hallmark featured caricaturised representations of Rebekka and Tomi Thorston, surrounded by the comic sans-rendered claim:

Purveyors of EPIC parties since 2010

He let out a sardonic chuckle in reaction; the Twins' parties were _infamous_.

The silhouette of a grinning jack-o'-lantern dominated a large portion of the poster, nestled above a block of text rendered in a vaguely creepy font:

You are hereby invited to party down at Rebekka and Tomi's Halloween smash.

 _When?_ \- Saturday October 29th  
 _Where?_ \- The Thorston House (26 Atlantic Street)  
 _What time?_ \- From 8 'til late.

BYOB and a buddy.

"'Smash' is definitely the right word, something will end up broken by the end of the night." he mused, before studying her expression more carefully. "You're not thinking of going, are you?"

She made a show of looking in two minds about it, and his suspicious were immediately raised.

"Astrid…"

"Just hear me out, you and I both know you're really good at making Halloween costumes, but you haven't made any the last few years."

"There hasn't been much for us to do for Halloween since we grew out of trick-or-treating." he responded.

"We could give this a try." she suggested.

"You know what their parties are like, something gets obliterated, and someone else also ends up obliterated, making a mess fit for Ragnarok… usually involving lots of puke." a deciphering look crossed Hamish's features again. "You've got an ulterior motive in making me go, you're unusually enthusiastic about this party."

She actually looked sheepish. "I don't know what you're talking about."

The realisation hit him like the school bell.

"No! No, no!" he shook his head. "You're not setting me up with some random stranger."

"Give me a little credit Hamish; I'm not going to set you up with a complete stranger. My cousin's family is planning to move to Berk and he's going to be staying with us around the time of the party. He officially came out a while ago and I think you'll find you both have things in common. I'm not asking you to marry him, just spend some time with him and see what happens."

He slunk a little back into his chair. "This seems a little one-sided; do I have any say in this?"

She gave him a bright smile. "Nope."

He let out a quiet groan. "Can I at least see a picture of him?"

She shook her head. "I'm not going to make it _that_ easy." she playfully toyed with him as she considered the plan she evidently had been concocting for a while. "We could play this like a masked ball, you'll have an idea of what his costume is, but his face will be disguised so that you'll be judging him on his personality, _not_ on his looks."

"Because I'm so shallow." he retorted.

"You're better than a lot of people, but I've seen the magazine you hide under your mattress. The one with Chris Pine on the cover." she good-naturedly teased, and his eyes suddenly looked anywhere but her face.

"Fine, point made." he groused. "Do I have any say in what costume I'm going to wear, or does it have to match his?"

She shook her head again, a more amiable expression on her face. "You can wear whatever you like. I'll let him know what you'll be dressed as so he knows who to talk to."

Hamish mulled it over. _I can go as anything, huh?_ He let out an amused snort as an idea came to mind. "If I've _carte blanche_ on what my costume's gonna be, I guess it's going to have to be something pretty memorable."

For the first time since she'd raised the subject of the Halloween party, and of setting Hamish up to meet her cousin, a flicker of dread danced across Astrid Hofferson's face; the chilled realisation she may have just bitten off more than she could chew.


	2. Pumpkin faces in the night

**October 23rd**

* * *

The soles of Astrid's sneakers slapped against the sidewalk of Jay Street as she made her way towards Hamish's house. The text message she'd received that morning had been cryptic, and her curiosity had been raised as her best friend wasn't usually in the business of being mysterious:

 _The costume's about done,_  
 _feel free to pop over after_  
 _you've had lunch with your_  
 _parents, if you're free :)._

The house with crimson trim and burnt-orange boards came into view and she quickened her pace, the eager anticipation as to what her best friend may've assembled spurring her on.

She rang the bell and waited, the door opened a minute later by the burly mass of man that was the Chief of Berk's Police Department, and father to the self-christened 'talking fishbone': Stoick.

The bearded man's face broke into a broad smile. "Astrid! Hamish didn't say you'd be 'round."

"I didn't know I'd be either until he texted me earlier. He wants to show me the costume he's been working on for Halloween."

"Ah." there was a particular tone in his voice, and dare she note, even the hint of amusement in his eyes? "I don't think you'll be disappointed." he added as he pulled the door open, providing her entry into the front hall.

 _"Mrrrroow."_ the welcoming call announced the arrival of the big black bundle of fur that was the Haddock family mascot. They had never quite determined if Toothless was a Maine Coon, or a Norwegian Forest, all they did know was that he was a stocky feline with fur to spare.

Astrid knelt down and gave Toothless a scratch under the chin, and he lapped up the affection, before rubbing himself against her shins. She eventually broke off the spoiling attention to make her way to Hamish's room, pausing before the closed door of his bedroom to knock against the woodwork.

"Come in." his wood-muffled voice instructed, and she stepped inside. A guitar sting sounded from the speakers of his laptop, followed shortly by a horn riff accompanied by drums and in quick succession, a keyboard.

"Wow."

He grinned, that was the response he was hoping for. "I just hope I get more of that reaction next Saturday."

 _"_ _…If there's something strange in you neighbourhood_  
 _Who you gonna call?..."_

She circled him, taking the costume in; for over a week he'd been utterly silent about what he'd chosen, and she could understand why. Had he not been able to get it finished in time, it would've been disappointing to know what it was in advance. She was no expert, but his Ghostbuster costume looked _really_ good.

"I can't believe you put this together in a week."

He nonchalantly shrugged, a mildly infuriating gesture, as if it'd taken him no effort at all to assemble the ensemble, even though she knew it had. "You know how enthusiastic I get when I get involved with something."

She smiled, she sure did. "So go on then, give me the breakdown."

"Okay." he nodded. "The nametag and Ghostbusters logo shoulder patch were from eBay, I didn't feel I could make anything I'd be happy with in the time I had available, and I didn't want to spend time on that which I could be using to make the Proton Pack… the backpack. Dad and I went into Providence and I got the suit and boots from an ex-army store. The elbow pads and goggles were from Walmart, which is where I got the backpack these straps came from." he gave one of the green shoulder straps a slight tug.

 _"..I ain't afraid of no ghost_  
 _If you're seeing things running through your head_  
 _Who can you call? Ghostbusters!..."_

"The Pack is assembled around the backpack, the biggest part of it is made out of two cereal boxes, while the round section with the four circular cut-outs was custom-made, as was the L-shaped piece by my left shoulder." he began to fumble with something on the Pack. "I also got _these_ at Walmart."

A moment later, the four round holes on the large round section lit up with chasing red LEDs, while a box with a rectangular hole cut into it lit up with blue animated lights.

She began to beam at the work he'd put into his costume. "It's amazing." she admitted.

"Thanks." he gave her an amused smile, followed by a curt nod. He then carefully shrugged the Pack off of his back and laid it down on his bed, turning off the lights as he went.

"Are there any lights in the… 'rifle'… part?"

"There are, I just need to install some batteries so they'll light up." he elaborated. With the Pack laid out on the bed, she could take in even more of the detail.

"Did you make those labels yourself?" she enquired, knowing well enough that if he wanted to, he could whip up replicas of whatever he needed with his computer graphics skills.

"I didn't have to, thankfully. There's a whole website dedicated to making replicas of this stuff. They've even started working out how to make copies of the props from the Paul Feig film."

Astrid, Hamish, and their mutual friend Fiske had gone to see the 2016 reboot of _Ghostbusters_ , and while their impressions had been mixed, they'd agreed to disagree when it came to their various criticisms.

"I might have to get you to help me with one of the costumes from it sometime." she nodded. "So apart from the batteries, are you all ready for the party?"

"I think so." he beamed, a beat later he asked: "How's yours coming along?"

"I think it's done."

"What are you going as?"

She echoed his shrug from earlier. "A Viking warrior."

He looked a little disappointed. "Oh come on Astrid, a Viking warrior, in a town whose whole theme is Vikings?"

She gave him a playful whack on the arm. "I wanted something easy to put together, we're not all handy with building and sewing."

He rubbed the sore spot on his arm. "Fine, but next year, we're doing something a bit more original for you."

"So there'll be a next year?"

He gave another shrug, this time with a half-smile. "There'll be a party somewhere next year, and I know you'll drag me to it if I wanted to go, or not."

"Yep." she smiled, and rested an arm on his shoulder. "No choice about it." she smirked, and he shook his head in playful defeat.


	3. I remember Halloween

**October 29th**

* * *

A chill air drifted from the ocean and up from the harbour as the sky grew dim in the west. A menagerie of bats, spiders, black cats, ghosts, skeletons and pumpkins had greeted Astrid as she made her way along Jay Street, several of the houses having already been decorated in preparation for the 31st.

The front door to the Haddock house opened, and Hamish stepped triumphantly into the doorway to greet her, putting on a look of mock alarm.

"A Viking! What am I gonna do?"

She smiled malevolently and spun the plastic axe by the handle, hoping the glow from the porch light would glint off of the weapon's silver paint.

"Surrender your mead, meats and virgins, for the glory of Thor." she laughed.

He let out a hearty chuckle, and took on a defiant pose. "You'll be disappointed, the best we've got to drink is Budweiser, the only meat we've got at the moment is the peperoni in the fridge, and as for virgins… there's just all… _this_."

The remark was enough to make her break character. "You just gestured to all of you!"

At the sound of a familiar voice, Toothless emerged from one of his many hiding spots. He gave the Viking a cursory sniff, before he lavished her with his customary greeting.

"All ready to go?" she asked as they stepped into the front hall, scratching the cat in his favourite spot. Hamish chuckled at seeing the often indifferent feline became putty in her hands once again.

"Almost, I just need to grab the drinks and lock up… Dad's at the station tonight." she waited as he disappeared in the direction of the kitchen, and returned an instant later with a 12-pack box of Izze. They gave Toothless one final bit of affection before they exited onto the porch, and he tested the now-secured front door to satisfy his inner worry.

Content, he picked up the box of sparkling juice and angled the makeshift Proton Pack so that it was facing her.

"Could you switch me on?"

Her melodic laugher reached his ears as she felt for the switch in the dying light. "Is that all I am to you, someone who can blow your fuses?" she teased, playing along to his unintended _double entendre_.

He couldn't hide his amusement anymore. "What can I say? I'm always looking out for the positives rather than the negatives."

It was then that she gave him a familiar whack to the arm, and he rubbed it as she pressed the switch, activating the LED lights on the pack and Proton Gun. "There you go, and your puns are getting worse."

"I know, I know. I've been spending too much time with George."

She checked the time on her phone, and glanced up as the last embers of sunset winked out in the distance.

"Fifteen to eight, let's get going."

"Right." he nodded as they proceeded down the garden path. "Let's get this disaster over with." he joked, and she rolled her eyes.

* * *

Atlantic Street lay roughly north-east of Hamish's house, in a small neighbourhood that butted up against the grounds of the High School, and the shore of DeBloise Cove. The relative seclusion of the far end of the street had led Tomi and Rebakka to spend much of their free time around the Town Square, and Barry Cuda's, in order to maximise the impact of their pranks.

As one of the older, and in past times more affluent streets in town, the houses had been granted more generously-proportioned plots of land, and the majority of dwellings adhered to the Queen Anne style.

As Astrid and Hamish navigated the sidewalk, the glow of the LEDs on his costume and the flashlight app on her smartphone lighting the way, they could hear the thump of music in the distance. Occasionally a car would drive past, taking more guests to the party.

"Am I allowed to know what your cousin's dressed as, or do I have to wait until we get to the twins' front door?"

She smirked in the darkness. "He said he was going to be dressed as something that was skeletal, and that he's 'a modern twist on an old idea'."

"Skeleton, with a twenty-sixteen twist. Got it." he nodded, mostly to himself. "I'm not making any promises of anything beyond casual conversation, though."

She let out an exaggerated groan. "Why do you have such little faith in my pick? I haven't given you reason to be this sceptical."

He deliberated on her point, before favouring her with an embellished shrug. " _Fine_. I just assumed that maybe because you've been so good at lots of other things, that you'd have to be bad at something, and it'd be your taste in guys for me."

She gave him another thud on the arm, and he laughed it off.

They'd rounded the sharp 90° turn near the end of the street, and they could now see three prominent houses clustered around a turning circle, the middle of which blazed with light and was draped in Halloween decorations. The shoulder of the roadway was cluttered with parked vehicles, and a few costumed party guests milling outside.

The two teenagers crossed the brick pathway leading to the house's antique porch, and spared a moment to make sure their attire was in good order before ringing the bell.

The door swung open, and they were greeted personally by Tomi and Rebekka.

"Welcome, oh weary travellers! Tonight you enter a hall most foul and horrible, you will surely lose your minds!" Tomi melodramatised from one half of the doorway, dressed in a weird chicken-like costume, whilst wearing sloppily-applied black and yellow face paint in a design that sort of resembled a skull.

Meanwhile Rebekka, who was dressed like a female version of Arnold Schwarzenegger's Terminator, gave both Hamish and Astrid a look that was at the same time mischievous and unsettling. "Have you brought a sacrifice for great Loki?"

Hamish hefted up the box of bottles, stifling the uncomfortable grunt that had threatened to pass his lips, and waited as the two teenage troublemakers conferred over the selection. Rebekka turned back to them with that unnerving smile again. "Good choice, you can enter… but remember: anything can happen once you're beyond these doors, and we're only sorta, kinda responsible for some of the stuff that might happen."

"So be warned!" Tomi added in a theatrically spooky voice.

Hamish shot one final questioning look at Astrid, and she shrugged at him playfully, before giving him a gentle nudge towards the door. Stuck to the doorframe above them was a crude, hand-written sign. Its vivid red blood-like lettering proclaimed:

Abandon all hope ye who enter here.


	4. Dead cats hanging from poles

_"_ _I was working in the lab, late one night_  
 _when my eyes befell and eerie sight_  
 _For my monster from his slab, began to rise_  
 _And suddenly to my surprise_  
 _He did the Mash, he did the Monster Mash…"_

As they stepped into the front hall of the twins' house, Tomi abandoned his dramatis persona long enough to clamp a mitten-clad hand on Hamish's shoulder.

"Awesome costume, by the way." he cheered, and it quickly became apparent it was a sentiment shared by a number of the other guests who were clustered around the base of the hall staircase. It was a pleasant boost to the freckled teenager's morale.

"Thanks, Tomi." the Ghostbuster returned, and the dreadlocked chicken creature sauntered off to attend to something else with his twin sister.

Hamish turned his eyes to the other guests who were gathered there, attired in a variety of costumes, some of which were well-made, while others weren't, and a good few were store-bought.

It also became apparent that there were a few different guys dressed as some form of skeleton spread amongst the rest of the guests.

"You did let your cousin know what my costume was going to be, right? I'm going to be spending most of the night talking to all these skeletons."

"I gave him a few clues, about as much as I've told you about his."

"Why all the secrecy, anyway?"

She let out a puff. "I wanted to make this as natural for you two as possible, I thought maybe it would make for a better first meeting if you two bumped into each other on your own, instead of me telling you where each other was." Astrid cast her blue eyes over the nearby revellers. "I haven't seen him yet, so you can skip anyone in this room if you want to. If we don't see him in a while, I'll abandon the plan and try phone him."

"Thanks." he gave her an appreciative smile.

"Let's drop these off and get some drinks, shall we?" she suggested, indicating the beverages they'd brought. The two of them made their way toward the buffet table in the large formal dining room.

* * *

 _"…Darkness falls across the land_  
 _The midnight hour is close at hand_  
 _Creatures crawl in search of blood_  
 _to terrorise y'awls' neighborhood!..."_

Vincent Price's voice crept from the stereo as clichéd organ music piped during the closing stanza of _Thriller_. Hamish and Astrid stood by the buffet table; while at the opposite end of the room, a collection of slightly inebriated and sober teenagers attempted to dance like Michael Jackson's zombies beneath a chandelier with coloured bulbs.

The two of them laughed as some of the dancers fell out of routine, and one even fell over onto the floor. The antics served to help Hamish relax a little after his growing nerves at their arrival, and he took a swig of his green-coloured drink, which somewhat tasted like orange juice, as the song came to an end. A brief pause circulated the room, and was followed by rising orchestral strings.

 _"Boys and girls of every age_  
 _Wouldn't you like to see something strange?_  
 _Come with us and you will see_  
 _This our town of Halloween…"_

His eyes were drawn from the improvised dance floor as Astrid fished out her smartphone. The movement of her thumb across the screen confirmed she'd received a message, and she scanned its contents before a smile played on her lips.

She returned the device to its denim domain, and gave him a brighter smile. "He says he thinks he's seen you, but he's gotten tied up in a game'."

With this new information, he trained his eyes back across the dining room, there were a couple of skeletons visible: a girl in a costume that resembled a skeletal _dia de los muertos_ spirit, and a man appropriately dressed like Skeleton Jack out of _A Nightmare Before Christmas_ , but in his 'Santa Jack' attire. Neither of the two however was in the process of playing a party game.

"There aren't any games being played in here." he observed. "Probably on the other side of the house, we haven't been there yet."

"Sure." she agreed, and took a quick draw from her own plastic cup.

They crossed the hall, finding a crowded front parlour on the opposite end of the first floor. The room was more dimly lit than the first two, but illumination was provided by a bountiful array of light-up plastic skulls, ghosts and smiling pumpkins.

Several sudden screams rang out from a group of guests crowded around a television that stood in one corner, playing a DVD of _The Woman in Black_. Towards the back of the room, there were guests clustered around a pool table, and more at a game of beer pong.

 _Yep, the makings of a_ classic _party by the twins._ His eyes were drawn to a skeleton that was dressed in a smart suit, his hand poised to send a Ping-Pong ball flying. "Wish me luck."

She gave him a thumbs up, and watched as he approached the table of beer pong players.

* * *

A fist hammered against the surface of the door and he waited, irritably aware of the dampness of sweat that clung to him and the myriad of scratches that criss-crossed his hands and arms.  
As he waited for the door to open, a low simmer of irritation quickly reached boiling point.

The door to the house cracked open an inch, and Tomi's disguised face peered through the crack.

"Who is it?"

"You know who it is!" he growled.

"We don't know… uh… 'Hewitt Iz'." Rebekka's voice called over the music.

"Would you stop jerking me around here!"

"I dunno, maybe we like jerking you around." she responded. "I know Tomi would like to jerk around with you, if you get my meaning."

"I got your stupid chicken, so let me in already."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. We can't let you in until we've made sure it's what we're after. This is a very exclusive, uh, deal."

"You let 'Hiccup' in, and Gustav! It can't be _that_ exclusive."

"That, sir, is fighting talk." Tomi responded.

"Just look at it already!" Stefan shouted, holding up the ridiculous creature he'd been ordered to acquire at short notice.

Tomi and Rebekka peered out at the annoyed-looking chicken held tightly in Stefan's left hand; the creature's breast was slathered with black and yellow paint, in a poor imitation of Tomi's own facial decoration.

At seeing the abomination of artistry, the dreadlocked boy's face lit up in delight. "It's real! Just like I dreamed!"

"So, let me in." Stefan asked, making his voice sound as sociable as humanly possible.

Rebekka opened the door wider. "Ooooh, did we say one chicken that looked like my brother? We meant two chickens. Sorry."

"Oooooh," Stefan pondered theatrically. "That's why I brought a spare." he held out his right hand, grasping an identical hen. "Now let me in."

"Okay." Tomi nodded.

"Sure." Rebekka agreed.

Stefan had only managed a single step toward the door when the twins both held up a hand each to stop him.

"But there's one more thing we need."

The chickens were hurled into the air with an indignant squawk as the bloodied and paint-speckled Viking warrior almost blew his top. "What?! What now?!"

The two twins remained as cool as a cucumber. "Yeah, we would love to let you in, Stefan. Really, we would. But you forgot the most important thing."

"Which is?"

"Uh, a sturgeon dressed like Chief Haddock."

"Give me a fucking break!" the chestnut-haired teenager fumed.

"Uh-uh, arguing with the party management can result in permanent banishment. And that's a lot of big words." Tomi warned.

Stefan remained standing there in silent rage, before he turned and stomped off down the path back toward the road.

"A sturgeon dressed like Chief Haddock. I'll give you both a sturgeon…"


	5. Little Dead are out in droves

_"_ _…With a bit of a mind flip_  
 _You're into a time slip_  
 _And nothing can ever be the same_  
 _You're spaced out on sensation! Ah!_  
 _Like you're under sedation!..."_

Hamish slunk back to the corner of the parlour that Astrid had ensconced herself.

"It wasn't him, though he said he was flattered with the interest."

She shot him a commiserating look. "Well, at least he took it well." he nodded unenthusiastically at her observation.

"Can you give me another clue?"

"Sure." she was about to extricate her phone again when there was a crash from the far side of the parlour, the music abruptly stopped mid-way through _The Time Warp_ as a result of what had just happened.

The two teenagers shared a look, before they darted over to the carnage that had overtaken and demolished the beer pong game. A body in a slightly mangled and paint-marked Viking warrior costume lay groaning on the floor, one leg still resting against the sill of the window he'd clambered/fallen through.

Hamish _knew_ that voice and chestnut hair, and he pushed through the onlookers to kneel down beside the prone bulk of muscle.

"Stefan! Can you hear me?"

"Uuuuggghhhhh."

"I think that's a 'yes'." Astrid helpfully translated.

"Just stay where you are, we've got help coming for you." the Ghostbuster dug out his phone and dialled 911.

"Did someone trip over the cable for the iPod speaker?" Tomi asked as the crowd gave his face paint a wide berth. "Oh, someone's killed Stefan. Cool."

"Sweet." Rebekka agreed, raising her phone to grab a photo. Astrid quickly stepped in to usher them out of the way and preserve what little remained of Stefan's dignity.

* * *

Hamish winced for the umpteenth time during the very short phone call as his uncle raised his voice on the other side of the line, reaching a volume that risked blowing his eardrum.

 _"…he'd better believe he's grounded, and I'll be talking to Stoick about this!"_

"I know, Uncle Sven, I know."

 _"Of all the hare-brained things to do…"_

The call suddenly went dead, and Hamish had to check to see if the call with his uncle had cut out.

Having determined that Sven had actually abruptly hung up on him, he returned his phone to his jumpsuit pocket and let himself sag against the outside wall of the Berk Medical Centre, expelling a puff of air as he went.

A recognisable chuckle caused him to crack an eye open, and he saw Astrid hovering at the edge of the sidewalk, a tall guy in a hoodie stood a short distance behind her. The guy had presumably given her a ride after Hamish had travelled with Stefan in the ambulance. "I'm glad I'm not in your shoes."

"Because that's usually such an enviable place to be." he drawled.

"How is he?"

Hamish straightened up from the surprising comfortable perch against the wall, maybe he was just too tired to care?

"If you're talking about Uncle Sven, he's pissed. You probably heard everything from over there thanks to his shouting. As for Stefan, the doctors aren't too worried about the bump to the head he gave himself when he face-planted that Ping-Pong table, but he's going to have a really _nice_ bruise."

"Tomi and Rebekka will love that." she turned her head toward the other guy. "They consider it a badge of honour if one of their pranks leads to a permanent injury, or something that's visible for months."

"Is it too late not to move here?" the other guy quipped, and Hamish's waning attention surged back to full focus.

"That's like, _two_ bad things about my hometown… or one larger, combined bad thing... You haven't met one of the good things yet."

Astrid gestured at Hamish. "Jack, this is Hamish. Hamish, meet Cousin Jack."

The guy stepped forward into the light. From the collar of the black hoodie rose a head with chiselled cheeks, a lop-sided smile that seemed to promise mischief, and a mismatching set of dark eyebrows beneath a wild head of pale blond, possible white hair (it was a little tricky to tell from the medical centre external lighting).

"Hey." Jack greeted, holding out a closed fist for Hamish to bump. "Nice Ghostbuster costume."

"Thanks." Hamish returned the fist-bump. "Good to meet you by the way, Astrid was not helpful at all about telling me anything about you." the auburn-haired teen winced as she thumped him on the arm again. A smile spread across Jack's face.

"She does that to you too?" he chuckled.

"Yep. Maybe we should form a support group?"

Astrid cleared her throat unsubtly, and the three of them broke into light-hearted chuckling.

"Anyway, welcome to Berk. It isn't usually _this_ exciting."

"Awww." Jack playfully whinged. "You got my hopes up."

"Sorry things didn't go to plan. I should've expected something with it being one of Tomi and Rebekka's parties."

"I did warn you about going." Hamish reminded. Beside them, Jack shrugged; his smile having morphed into a carefree smirk.

"You can't say it wasn't memorable." he offered. "If you hadn't gone, I wouldn't have gotten to see either of your costumes, and you wouldn't have seen mine."

He pulled the hood of his hoodie over his head, revealing a printed skull face with a pair of eye holes cut into it so he could see. He then unhooked something from his back, and unfurled a pair of collapsible miniature scythes.

Astrid's clue then jumped to the forefront of Hamish's brain: "'A modern twist on an old idea' – a twenty-first century Grim Reaper."

Jack performed a stage bow, something that seemed a little unsettling given his costume. He then pushed the hood back to reveal his face once more. "It was all I could whip up in the time I had, maybe you could help me with next year's costume."

Astrid gave Hamish a knowing look and he rolled his eyes, before turning his attention back to Jack.

"Sure, I can think of a few tweaks."

Jack smiled again, not the more carefree one he often wore, but something more heartfelt.

"Where were you, when you were stuck in the party game? I thought the only games were in the room my cousin wrecked."

"I was in the kitchen. A couple of girls dressed like the twins from _The Shining_ dragged me into a game of 'spin the bottle'; I didn't have the heart to tell them they were wasting their time."

Another round of amused laughter circled the group, dropping off into an amiable lull in the conversation. Wishing to break the pause, Jack dug something out of his hoodie pockets. "I swiped these from the party, seeing as we had to leave so early."

The objects he'd retrieved were a couple of bags of candy. He handed a pack of Twizzlers to Astrid, who eagerly plucked them from his hand. He then ripped open a bag of M&Ms and offered it out to the other male teen, who happily accepted some of the offering.

As he munched on them, Hamish dug out his phone again and began to scroll through his playlist, before he found something appropriate.

 _"_ _Bonfires burning bright_  
 _Pumpkin faces in the night_  
 _I remember Halloween_  
 _Dead Cats hanging from poles_  
 _Little Dead are out in droves_  
 _I remember Halloween…"_

"Given it isn't actually the thirty-first yet, Happy Mischief Night, guys." Jack smiled.

"Happy Samhain." Hamish added.

"Happy Halloween." Astrid agreed, before tearing at the candy rope with her teeth.

 _"…Brown Leafed Vertigo_  
 _Where skeletal life is known_  
 _I remember Halloween_  
 _This day anything goes_  
 _Burning bodies hanging from poles_  
 _I remember Halloween_  
 _Halloweeeeen_  
 _Halloweeeeen_  
 _Halloweeeeen_  
 _Halloween!…"_

* * *

 **The End**


End file.
